064 The Erickson Report for October 27 to November 10, Page 3: The CPC letter

064 The Erickson Report for October 27 to November 10, Page 3: The CPC letter

So. On October 24, 30 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus sent a letter to the White House that in effect suggested trying to open a conversation with Russia about a potential diplomatic end to its war on Ukraine.

The result was what Politico called a "firestorm" of hostile reaction, one fueled to no small degree by how the Washington Post described the letter, as one urging Blahden to "dramatically shift his strategy on the Ukraine war," calling it a break with official policy and a rupture in the party.

The reaction was swift enough and hostile enough that by that evening caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal was issuing a "clarification" and by the next day it had been withdrawn altogether.

But it wasn't a break; in fact the letter was quite anodyne, including praise and reasserting support for Blahden and insisting that no agreement can be reached without the approval of Ukraine.

So what got it in so much trouble? It comes down to this sentiment, quoting the letter:

[I]f there is a way to end the war while preserving a free and independent Ukraine, it is America’s responsibility to pursue every diplomatic avenue to support such a solution that is acceptable to the people of Ukraine. The alternative to diplomacy is protracted war, with both its attendant certainties and catastrophic and unknowable risks.

In other words, as The Intercept put it, "That the letter was met with fierce opposition is a measure of the space available for debate among congressional Democrats when it comes to support for the war and how it might be stopped before it turns nuclear: roughly zero."

So invested have the Democratic hierarchy and particularly its hack sycophants become in the glories of war and the shimmering image of outright military defeat of Russia that simply proposing the idea of talking about the possibility of a settlement is beyond he pale.

Indeed, it often seems those hack sycophants are more intested in "decisive victory" through "overwhelming force" than that hierarchy is. Bluntly, I believe that's because they see such a victory as proper retibution for Russia's having, in their minds, been single-handedly responsible for inflicting Tweetie-pie on us.

Among the worst of those hack sycophants is Markos Moulitsas, founder of DailyKos, someone fond of calling people "tankies," a 1950s-era anti-communist smear accusing people of maintaining blind support of the Soviet Union even after its invasion of Hungary in 1954. Referring now to the letter, he charged the signers "are now making common cause with Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Green, JD Vance, and the rest of the MAGA crowd. Which Ukrainians do these ‘progressives’ want abandoned to mass murder and rape, in their attempt to prop up a flailing Russia?"

Thus in one statement accusing them both of lining up with the worst of the GOPpers and of being on Russia's side in the war - siding with enemies both domestic and foreign.

But there is another point, which is that part of the reason for the "firestorm" is not what was said but who said it, that at least part of the response was the desire of the party hierarchy to smack down party progressives, who have gradually been gaining in influence.

The letter noted that Blahden himself has echoed some of what it said, having repeatedly expressed that only negotiations can ultimately end the conflict, that nuclear war is more imminent now than at any time since the Cuban missile crisis, and that he's worried about the fact that Putin "doesn’t have a way out right now, and I’m trying to figure out what we do about that.”

What's more, on October 15, Saint Barack said during an interview on the podcast “Pod Save America,” that he is concerned about the fact that, quoting, "lines of communication between the White House and the Kremlin are probably as weak as they have been in a very long time. Even in some of the lowest points of the Cold War, there was still a sense of the ability to pick up a phone and work through diplomatic channels to send clear signals."

And precisely because Putin has so centralized decision-making, quoting again, "us finding ways in which some of that communication can be reestablished would be important."

Which is hardly different from what the letter said, just without the reference to Ukraine.

Meanwhile, just under a week earlier, retired Adm. Mike Mullen, former chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during an appearance on the ABC show “This Week” that the possibility that Russia might use battlefield nuclear weapons "speaks to the need to ... do everything we possibly can to try to get to the table to resolve this thing," adding that it’s up to Secretary of State Blinken and other diplomats “to figure out a way to get both Zelenskyy and Putin to the table.”

Which in some ways goes beyond what the letter said.

Even former US Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, who was one of Obama’s key advisers and a staunch supporter of Ukraine, said he agreed with the idea of making the effort, doubting only it would get very far.

None of those statements - from Biden, from Obama, from Mullen, from McFaul, produced anything like the reaction seen here, in fact hardly any reaction at all beyond some tut-tutting that Biden may have overstated the probability of Putin actually going nuclear.

But no matter. It was members of the CPC that said it and they needed to be smacked down. So effective was that smackdown, so complete the capitulation, that not only was the letter withdrawn, the announcement of the withdrawal included the statement "Every war ends with diplomacy, and this one will too after Ukrainian victory." (That is, of course, my emphasis because it definitely needed to be emphasized.)

And the hierarchy smiles and the hack sycophants go back to scanning for hints of dissent.

Finally something not directly related to the letter and the reaction but something related to Ukraine and something you should be aware of.

Note that Biden said he's worried that Putin "doesn't have a way out." Well, a legitimate question is, once Ukraine didn't collapse immediately upon the invasion, did they ever want him to have one.

First, never forget that the US alone has to date given Ukraine $17.5 billion in direct military aid since the invasion. You can argue that every penny of that was fully justified, but point here is that you can't say we are passive observers of events or merely moral backers of Ukraine. The US and rest of NATO are directly involved. This is not a war of Russia versus Ukraine, it is a proxy war between Russia and NATO, with Ukraine the battlefield on which it is being fought.

With that in mind, recall that back in mid-March, as I noted at the time, there were some negotiations going on between Ukranian and Russian officials with some expressions of optimism coming from both sides. Not that a settlement was imminent but the progress toward one was being made.

Then on April 9, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a surprise visit to Kyiv, where, according to the Ukrainian news outlet Ukrayinska Pravda ("Ukranian Truth"), he brought two simple messages to the capitol:

One: Putin is a war criminal; he should be pressured, not negotiated with.
Two: Even if  Ukraine is ready to sign some agreements with Putin, NATO is not.

Three days later, Putin said negotiations were at a dead end.

Maybe the timing was coincidental, but the fact that Zelenskyy also lost all interest in negotiations right around the same time, a time, remember, well before Ukraine's recent battleground successes, gives a rather obvious interpretation at least some weight, further bolstered by the fact that at the same time - the first week of April - the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft was reporting that

there are several lines of evidence that suggest that the U.S. is inhibiting a diplomatic solution in Ukraine,

including, significantly, it's total absence from those very March negotiations, lending no assistance, offering no support.

Now, it's not certain the conclusion this points to is true but there is reasonable cause to believe it, a conclusion that creates the image not of the US and NATO causing the war, one of the US inviting or perhaps more accurately baiting Putin to attack - although that would not be unprecedented in US foreign policy - but one of the US and NATO allowing it to continue to take advantage of an opportunity to "pressure" Putin.

But "cause" versus "allow to continue" is somthing I would call a distinction without a difference. It surely makes difference to the homeless and the refugees; it even more surely makes no damn difference at all to the dead.

So we don't know if this idea is true, and in fact you have to hope it's not true because it would be quite heinous if it is.

Then again, war usually is.